Franklin India Prima exits IT, bets on pharma

Franklin India Prima Fund upped its investments in the pharma, engineering and capital goods sectors, while exiting the IT sector in the month of June.

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Franklin India Prima exits IT, bets on pharma

Franklin India Prima Fund upped its investments in the pharma, engineering and capital goods sectors, while exiting the IT sector in the month of June.

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Franklin India Prima Fund boosted its investments in the pharma sector as it introduced Cadila Healthcare in its portfolio. The scheme also bought more of Torrent Pharmaceuticals, Matrix Labs and Ipca Labs.

Investments in the engineering & capital goods sector were also increased as the scheme bought over 3 lakh shares of Esab India.

However, the scheme exited the IT sector as it completely off-loaded Mphasis BFL in June. Exposure to the cement sector was also slashed as the scheme exited Birla Corporation and Patel Engineering. (See the complete list - What is Franklin India Prima Fund buying/selling?)

Investments in chemicals sector too saw a significant cut as the scheme exited United Phosphorus and Clariant Chemicals.

Exposure to food & beverages sector was also slashed as the scheme exited Shaw Wallace, Voltas and Repro India. It sold over 4 lakh shares of United Breweries, and over 2 lakh shares of Assam Company.

Jaiprakash Associates, Aditya Birla Nuvo, and FAG Bearing India were the top stocks held by the scheme in June. Cement & Construction (16.43%), Pharmaceuticals (14.59%) and Automotive (11.58%) were the top invested sectors in the scheme's portfolio. (Check out - Top stocks held by Franklin India Prima Fund).

The equity exposure of the scheme has dropped significantly from 97.28% to 90.28%. The total assets managed by the scheme have also dropped over the month from Rs 2057.77 crore to Rs 1715.99 crore as on June 30, 2006.

Over the last one year, Franklin India Prima Fund has yielded 20.5% returns as against 31.06% yielded by its benchmark S&P CNX 500 as on July 13, 2006.